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Battle of Palmdale [Chat]
Thomamelas
Only one man can kill this many Russians. Bring his guitar to me! Registered User regular
Only one man can kill this many Russians. Bring his guitar to me! Registered User regular
So on the morning of August 16th, 1956 the US Navy launched a F6F-5K. Which was a Hellcat fighter converted to drone use. It's final flight was to be a missile test, after take off turning west to fly over the Pacific Ocean. Except it had other plans. After take off, during the transition from ground based control to airship based control something went wrong. And the Hellcat started going southeast from Point Mugu Naval Air Station. Which put the Hellcat on a path toward LA.
As you can imagine this set off a bit of a panic. An aircraft landing in LA could lead to deaths and lots of property damage. But the Navy didn't have anything that could catch it. So the Air Force was contacted and a pair of F-89D Scorpion were launched. The Scorpion is an interceptor. It was designed to attack waves of Soviet bombers. And when you're trying to break up Soviet bombers, you want to do it as far out as you can. So interceptors generally made trade offs for the goal of speed. And part of those trade offs are their weapons mix. They had rocket pods but no internal guns. Lacking the fuel for a protracted dogfight, it was felt that removing the guns would provide more speed.
So the Air Force found itself facing an unarmed drone had started circling in the desert area north west of LA and south west of Palmdale. With a weapons mix that was designed to hit waves of slow moving bombers flying in formation. But they had 208 rockets between them and they felt confident they could take down the aircraft. The D model Scorpions even had the shiny new E-6 fire control systems. All they needed to do was point the front of the aircraft at the drone, select if they were firing at the tails or from the side and the system would launch for them. Good in theory, less good in practice since the system wouldn't actually launch the rockets. Leaving the pilots to fire them manually.
Which wouldn't have been a challenge except that with the shiny new fire control system it was decided that clearly they don't need manual gunsights for the rocket. Still confident, the pilots set their rockets to fire in three groups and started to make runs on the aircraft. A few rockets managed glancing hits but none that set off the Mk 4 rockets. Now some people might be horrified at the idea of firing off rockets over sparsely but still populated areas. The pilots took care to try to avoid firing them at densely populated areas and had confidence that the safety in the Mk 4s would work. When the rocket found itself decelerating it was supposed to disarm. Of the 208 rockets, 197 were accounted for. 15 were found disarmed.
The rockets started numerous wildfires. The big one being around 350 acres and coming close to an explosives plant. Shrapnel and debris from the rockets landed in several homes, thankfully causing no injuries. Two cars were damaged. One took pieces from the rocket to the radiator and front tire. The other was a utility truck. The crew using it had decided to stop and eat lunch under a shady tree. Their lunch was interrupted when the rocket struck the utility truck and went off. Neither member of the crew was injured.
The two Scorpions returned to their base. And the Hellcat continued to circle for a bit. Eventually it crashed in the desert, harming no one. It wouldn't be found for another 41 years. And thus ended the Battle of Palmdale.
As you can imagine this set off a bit of a panic. An aircraft landing in LA could lead to deaths and lots of property damage. But the Navy didn't have anything that could catch it. So the Air Force was contacted and a pair of F-89D Scorpion were launched. The Scorpion is an interceptor. It was designed to attack waves of Soviet bombers. And when you're trying to break up Soviet bombers, you want to do it as far out as you can. So interceptors generally made trade offs for the goal of speed. And part of those trade offs are their weapons mix. They had rocket pods but no internal guns. Lacking the fuel for a protracted dogfight, it was felt that removing the guns would provide more speed.
So the Air Force found itself facing an unarmed drone had started circling in the desert area north west of LA and south west of Palmdale. With a weapons mix that was designed to hit waves of slow moving bombers flying in formation. But they had 208 rockets between them and they felt confident they could take down the aircraft. The D model Scorpions even had the shiny new E-6 fire control systems. All they needed to do was point the front of the aircraft at the drone, select if they were firing at the tails or from the side and the system would launch for them. Good in theory, less good in practice since the system wouldn't actually launch the rockets. Leaving the pilots to fire them manually.
Which wouldn't have been a challenge except that with the shiny new fire control system it was decided that clearly they don't need manual gunsights for the rocket. Still confident, the pilots set their rockets to fire in three groups and started to make runs on the aircraft. A few rockets managed glancing hits but none that set off the Mk 4 rockets. Now some people might be horrified at the idea of firing off rockets over sparsely but still populated areas. The pilots took care to try to avoid firing them at densely populated areas and had confidence that the safety in the Mk 4s would work. When the rocket found itself decelerating it was supposed to disarm. Of the 208 rockets, 197 were accounted for. 15 were found disarmed.
The rockets started numerous wildfires. The big one being around 350 acres and coming close to an explosives plant. Shrapnel and debris from the rockets landed in several homes, thankfully causing no injuries. Two cars were damaged. One took pieces from the rocket to the radiator and front tire. The other was a utility truck. The crew using it had decided to stop and eat lunch under a shady tree. Their lunch was interrupted when the rocket struck the utility truck and went off. Neither member of the crew was injured.
The two Scorpions returned to their base. And the Hellcat continued to circle for a bit. Eventually it crashed in the desert, harming no one. It wouldn't be found for another 41 years. And thus ended the Battle of Palmdale.
+10
Posts
Yer city was great, I'll ah come back, see?
Check out my site, the Bismuth Heart | My Twitter
Yeah. That's a game I was interested in then noped the fuck out of buying.
Check out my site, the Bismuth Heart | My Twitter
Presented without comment.
Rock Band DLC | GW:OttW - arrcd | WLD - Thortar
Basically how do I explain to a person that he's an idiot that doesn't know what he's talking about? It's one thing to know someone is an idiot, it's another to be able to explain why.
shhhhh
it'll be over soon.
http://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/207589/after-chat-with-archie#latest
They've been announcing big attacks ahead of time to give civilians time to get out or find shelter
*Looks at his Hadrian succession OP*
technically Thom was a minute early, but DUE was a minute late
tough call, tough call
Yeah but I have pics.
and my [chat] is seasonally appropriate.
Let's move forward having known we did the right thing.
I pledge allegiance to each thread
@Ludious
I'd point out a couple of things. Their aren't a lot of points for the Iraqi Army to hit for ISIS strongholds in Iraq. Mosul is the last big stronghold for them in Iraq. And it doesn't take a lot to predict where the Iraqi Army would go. They have also done a rather slow build up in the area. Partly because there are a lot of moving parts to this beyond just the Iraqi Army. You have various militas and Peshmerga forces to integrate. So it's been pretty clear for months that Mosul's days are numbered.
Then you have the hope of trying to clear out as many civilians as possible, and hopefully convincing ISIS that the level of force they are facing is so overwhelming that they withdraw. The fight for Mosul itself is going to be nasty. City fighting is. City fighting with a civilian population in the city means massive death tolls. So the hope was to encourage people to flee. You also have some humanitarian stuff like setting up refugee camps in advance.
So the goal here isn't really a surprise attack. The goal with Mosul is to create a situation where the enemy withdraws because they can't win, and if it does come to a fight, trying to be as humane as possible in a situation that will be horrifying. Speed in this case would be fucking terrible. It would mean a lot more lives lost for the Iraqi forces and more civilian deaths.
As for Trump's love of Patton and MacArthur. Patton was a fine tactical general but he was a huge advocate of going from WWII right into WWIII. He was a guy you could tell to accomplish an objective and he would. He wasn't great at defining what the objectives should be. And Patton was a calvary commander. His response to everything was attack and attack now. But that conflicts with the political goals with the capture of Mosul. MacArthur was just a fucking idiot. Generally the nicest thing said about him is that he didn't bungle the post war governing of Japan. But his actions in WWII and Korea showed horrifying lapses of judgement. Honestly he would have been ideal as a general you send to Congress as long as you make sure you have enough blackmail material on him to keep Congress from appointing him to the Joint Chiefs. He really had no business leading units in the field.
Short answer is: We're trying to avoid killing hundreds of thousands of poor people who are in the wrong place at the wrong time.
go for it
I feel like a DK op could be good.
I will wait.
Only thing I would add is sometimes you want to let the "good guys" know that yes, we are coming so just hold on a bit more and help is on the way.
-Indiana Solo, runner of blades
yes it is true
DK just hold on to hope and we willo arrive for your glorious chat op. help is on the way.
fuck up once and you break your thumb / if you're happy at all then you're god damn dumb
that's right we're on a fucked up cruise / God is dead but at least we have booze
bad things happen, no one knows why / the sun burns out and everyone dies
Excuse me while I have a small cry and tell my wife I love her.
fuck up once and you break your thumb / if you're happy at all then you're god damn dumb
that's right we're on a fucked up cruise / God is dead but at least we have booze
bad things happen, no one knows why / the sun burns out and everyone dies
His head isn't THAT large
that was not my most popular post
I just thought it was funny, I'm sorry if anyone got sad about it
I mean, ya it's funny in a existential dread kind of way...
Yes.
Rock Band DLC | GW:OttW - arrcd | WLD - Thortar